


As Long As You Love Me So

by aisydays



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Arum has Feelings about winter, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Holidays, Multi, TPP Secret Santa, and he also has feelings about his partners, in the sense that Damien is an Anxious Boy, just these three idiots in love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-24
Updated: 2018-12-24
Packaged: 2019-09-26 10:05:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17139764
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aisydays/pseuds/aisydays
Summary: It's winter in the Citadel. Arum is not best pleased about this. Luckily he has other matters to keep him occupied





	As Long As You Love Me So

**Author's Note:**

  * For [PrivateBi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/PrivateBi/gifts).



> This was written for the wonderful PrivateBi as part of the Penumbra Podcast Secret Santa! I hope you enjoy it!
> 
> The title comes from the lyrics of Let It Snow because my work has been playing Christmas songs non stop and I have been brainwashed. Fun fact: the title was going to be Arum, It's Cold Outside but even I have my limits

Arum’s feelings on winter were… conflicted at best.

 

On the one hand, it was cold - too cold. Unbearably cold. The chill sank right through to his bones, making him sluggish and fatigued and completely unable to work. The Keep admittedly did an… acceptable job at keeping itself warm, no matter what happened outside, but some of his experiments needed the fresh air, and despite his best efforts, he could never last the winter without a few of them dying out. 

 

Then there were the dark nights, the limited sunlight hours, the way the gloom snuck up on  you before you even noticed, suffocating in its inky blackness - not, of course, that Arum was afraid of the dark. He wasn’t a hatchling anymore.

 

That didn’t stop him from carrying glow-moss with him at all times. It didn’t hurt to be prepared, after all. 

 

And, yet, despite the gloom and the cold, even Arum had to admit there were certain… advantages to the winter months. 

 

The way his humans’ faces looked flushed with the cold for one - the faint red blush that glowed under Damien’s freckles and lit up Rilla’s cheeks. The smells that swirled through the air of Rilla’s cottage, spiced and sweet in a way Arum had never experienced before, all leading to the large pot bubbling away on the stove that held some kind of mulled tea. The way Damien’s eyes seemed to get so much brighter as he talked about the winter solstice, or Saint Lelia’s Night as he insisted on calling it.

 

“It was on the longest night of the year, my love, way back when the Second Citadel was young, and still recovering from the brutal attacks of the mon-” It was almost amusing, watching his love’s face fall as he realised what he’d just said. “Of - of course that is to say, well, I don’t know if I should call it an attack really, it was more nuanced than that of course and-” A soft hand on Damien’s arm slowed his deluge of words, as Arum moved closer to his poet. The request for a story had been intended to calm the nervous knight, something well worn and comfortable that Damien could lose himself in the telling of. Arum hadn’t anticipated quite how many of his tales involved, well, monsters. And the slaying thereof. It seemed like almost all human festivals had some basis in conflicts between the two, or the aftermath of the First Citadel. Arum didn’t understand this obsession with the past, but even he could appreciate a good story.

 

And any story was a good one when it was Damien telling it.

 

“It’s fine, honeysuckle. Continue your tale. Tell me more about why you humans insist on celebrating the fact that today will be the shortest, and, might I remind you, coldest day of the year.” As he spoke, Arum could feel Damien relaxing into his arms, the tension that had snuck into his frame melting away like snow in the sunlight. His honeysuckle smiled tentatively up at him before resuming his tale.

 

“The Second Citadel was still recovering from the attacks, and with the oncoming winter, the nights were becoming longer, darker, colder. The people of the Citadel feared for their lives in these times, left vulnerable in the dark, their supplies of food and fuel ever diminishing. These were dark times Arum, dark and worrying times. And yet, within the darkness, there was a light. A woman, a healer with incredible talents, beyond any of those who came before her.”

 

Arum couldn’t help but snort at this. “No match for our Rilla, I’ll bet.” Damien smiled adoringly, mind clearly occupied with thought of his- no, their fiancee. Their fiancee who, at this very moment, was making her rounds of the Citadel, dispensing poultices and.. Wiping noses, or whatever it was she did as a healer. Hence why Arum was here, at her cottage, keeping Damien company over the holiday. Purely out of duty, of course. The cosy atmosphere and glowing fire and warm body pressed against his were just welcome additions. 

 

Distracted by his thoughts, Arum didn’t notice at first how Damien’s besotted expression had slipped. He was staring out of the window, into the gloom that lay beyond the soft light cast through the cottage windows. His hands had resumed the nervous movements they had been occupied with when Arum had arrived, twisting the hem of his tunic between his fingers. Arum slid a hand down Damien’s side, coming to rest just over his love’s hand. “She’ll be fine, honeysuckle. Don’t worry.”

 

The sound of his voice seemed to startle Damien out of his thoughts. His hand jerked away from his clothing and Arum caught it, entangling their fingers and rubbing a clawed thumb gently across the back of Damien’s hand. The pair sat in silence for a moment before Damien spoke up. “What if- what if something has happened to her? What if she’s out there in the cold even now?”

 

“She’s perfectly safe”

 

“We don’t know that!” Damien’s breaths were coming quicker, Arum could feel his pulse start to quicken under his fingers. 

 

“She could have been attacked by a thief, or a monster, or, or a thieving monster” Arum couldn’t help but feel slightly offended, but he held his tongue, just this once. Damien didn’t need to be argued with right now. Not while his eyes were shining with welling tears and his words were tumbling over each other like rocks in a stream. “It’s so dark out there, and I can’t be there for her, I’m supposed to be a  _ knight  _ Arum, what kind of a knight allows his love to go out into the night alone, with no protection at all, I’ve failed in my duty…” His words trailed off into ragged breaths. Responding so quickly it was almost reflexive, Arum pulled his lover close to his chest, wrapping all four scaled arms tightly around Damien's torso and taking deep exaggerated breaths. The combination of the comforting pressure and something for Damien to focus on appeared to be somewhat assaying his anxiety; the tension bled slowly out of him as he slumped against the lizard's chest, curling into him and pressing his face into the junction where scaled neck met broad shoulder. Arum nuzzled his face into Damien's hair, muttering quiet but soothing words. “Amaryllis will be fine, Damien. She is strong and capable and even if she were not, she is intelligent enough to know how to keep herself safe. Your duty may be to protect, but sometimes people can protect themselves. You know that, Damien, and you know that is does not, under any circumstances, make you a failure or any less of a knight.”

 

“But… I should be…” Damien protested weakly, words muffled in Arum's chest. “Should be what? Resting?” Arum replied, almost sharply. He may not have been courting Damien for long, if you could even call what they had been through a courtship, but he had already seen the stubborn knight overexert himself time and time again, insisting on working through injury, exhaustion, even illness. Far be it from him to stop anyone from doing what they wanted of course, that would have gone against the monstrous codes he reluctantly lived by, but this was getting ridiculous. And so here he was, on Damien babysitting duty, stopping him from walking out into the cold dark night with a broken arm, bruises all over his side that Arum was carefully avoiding, and the same stubborn fire burning in his eyes that had carried him through their first duel. A fire that seemed to be smoldering in Damien's eyes even now. 

 

He started struggling against Arum’s embrace, attempting to rise to his feet. The lizard attempted to hold him back, ever mindful of the other man's injuries. “Damien, no. Rilla is-”

 

“What am I now, Arum?” A musical voice rang out through the cottage. In their struggles, neither had heard the door creak open, nor felt the blast of cold air that signalled Rilla's arrival into their home. In an instant, Arum's grip loosened and Damien struggled to his feet, rushing over to wrap his fiancée up in a tight, albeit one armed, embrace. Even from his position on the couch, Arum could hear Damien's babbling. “Rilla, my Amaryllis, my forever flower, my heart has ached for you this night, I have been consumed with my concern, nay, my fear, my absolute terror that you were out there all alone, and, and-” 

 

His words were cut short by a kiss from Rilla that Damien visibly melted into. It warmed Arum's heart to see such an unabashed show of affection. Sometimes, in his darkest moments, he worried about his inability to express himself so openly, that his subtle tells couldn't compare to the way Damien wore his heart on his sleeve, or even the many ways  Rilla showed her careful, constant affection. But his loves had both assured him, time and time again, that even the smallest smile or gentle touch from him was worth just as much as a heartfelt confession from Damien, or Rilla's encouraging words guiding him through a particularly difficult experiment. Love was a difficult language to decode, but Arum was fast becoming fluent.

 

The pair broke apart and Rilla started to move around the cottage, putting away her seemingly unlimited supply of tools and instruments. Arum didn't know the use of half of them, and privately still didn't understand the purpose of any of them, but still he rose from his seat to help her. She gave him a grateful smile as she dropped her now empty satchel to the floor. 

 

“It's getting cold out there, even for the Citadel. We'll have snow tonight” Arum tried to hide his irritation but Rilla, ever perceptive Amaryllis, caught him out of the corner of her eye. “You'll have to stay here for tonight Arum, if you can bear being away from your Keep for so long” she said, a glint of laughter in her eyes. Arum felt his frill rise in embarrassment. “I wouldn't want to intrude on your hospitality Rilla” he muttered, shuffling the bottles of herbs he was currently tidying. Even now, when he knew he was loved and appreciated, the thought of overstaying a welcome, of becoming a burden on the people he loved, was somehow a worse prospect than walking back to the Keep in the snow. He was concentrating so hard on seeming nonchalant, hiding his inner turmo as he had done for so long, that Arum didn't notice Damien approaching him until he felt a warm hand on one of his arms.

 

“Arum. My precious lord lily. You would never be an intruder in this house. You have nothing to worry about.” He said, voice soft and calm in the same way Rilla's was when she was talking her love down from a panic. Arum opened his mouth to point out both the irony of the fact that he had in fact been an intruder in the most literal sense the first time he visited the cottage - the wood around the door frame still bore the scars of his claws- and that of Damien, of all people, telling  _ him _ not to be worried.  But before he could speak, Rilla joined them, tucking herself into Arum's side. Even her presence beside him was a comfort. 

 

The three of them stood like that for a few long moments, just gazing out of Rilla's window, watching a few fat flakes of snow drift past. The longer Arum stood in the warmth, as the world outside grew colder and covered in a blanket of white while he was inside, with people he loved who loved him back, the less appealing the idea of leaving became. It took little more than Damien's good hand linked in his, gently pulling him towards the couch, and Rilla's quiet humming as she fetched paper and pen and recorder to begin the arduous (and, in Arum's mind, completely unnecessary) process of noting down all she had learnt on her trip, to firmly convince Arum that this was where he needed to stay. Here, where he was warm and showered in affection, where he could lie back and listen to Damien tell him tales of Saints and bravery and hope even in the darkest of times. 

 

And as he drifted off to sleep that night, tangled in limbs that weren't just his own, Arum entertained the thought that maybe, this could be home.

 


End file.
